China expert: Beijing fears probe of 'crime of the century'

The investigations of the origins of the coronavirus pandemic strike fear in the heart of Chinese Communist officials, according to a China expert.

Beijing's incompetence and it's apparent cover-up already is clear, said Gordon Chang in an interview Tuesday with the Fox News Channel's Sean Hannity.

"[T]hey know that something really wrong is going to be exposed," said Chang, a foreign affairs journalist and author.

Their actions, he said, "have been malicious in terms of deliberately taking actions that would inevitably lead to the spread of the virus outside of China’s borders."

"So this is the crime of the century," Chang declared.

The European Union said Tuesday its member states will co-sponsor a resolution calling for an independent investigation.

The White House, ABC reported, citing two administration officials, has ordered U.S. intelligence agencies to review intercepted communications and other data to see whether China and possibly the World Health Organization concealed information. President Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have said they believe the virus escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

The international community's moves to investigate will make China's leaders feel "cornered," Chang said.

"Chinese leaders ... know they have no defense, and so therefore they are acting belligerently," he said. "This is a very dangerous period."

Chang was joined in the interview by Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., who said "calls for an international invetigation like the European Union will now make, that Australia's already made, are going to be met with deaf ears in China, and it's only going to raise the stakes for making China pay for this pandemic.

"Some things we can do, like changing our sovereign immunity laws to make sure that Americans can sue the Chinese officials who are responsible for this pandemic," Cotton said.

"There are a lot of overdue actions we can take as well, like bringing our manufacturing base back to the United States, to quit letting China taking our jobs or stealing our intellectual property. I think that is going to be a big part of the reaction you see from Congress in the months ahead."

Chang said he believes the true death toll in the city of Wuhan, where the coronavirus is believed to have originated, is as many as 50,000.

"There have been clusters of disease all throughout the country. We are seeing a second wave ... but we really don't know, because they have been extraordinary in covering up all of this. So we can only guess but it’s many multiples of what they’ve been reporting."

The official death count in Hubei Province, where Wuhan is located, is 4,512.

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